Indigenous culture recovered

The passing on of skills, tradition and culture happen every day in every interaction between generations. However a project that saw the skills of building a bark canoe passed from Gunai/Kurnai Elder Uncle Albert Mullet to his grandson has particular significance.

Featuring Gippslanders Cameron Cope and Steaphan Paton, it follows them and other young men being taught how to strip bark from a tree and construct a canoe under the instruction of Gunai/Kurnai Elder Uncle Albert Mullett, Steaphan's grandfather.

Steaphan says there is great significance in the building of the canoe and naming the project Boorun's Canoe in terms of Gippsland Aboriginal stories.

"He's the father of all Gunai/Kurnai people. Boorun came to Gippsland carrying a canoe on his head. He heard this tapping sound the whole way. When he got down to Port Albert and put the canoe in the water there was Tuk, a musk duck sitting in there and she became the mother of all Gunai/Kurnai people."

Photographer Cameron Cope acknowledges that for many people the Aboriginal culture of Gippsland is in large part, already lost.

However, the truth is that many cultural practices and knowledge survive, including the skills passed on by Uncle Albert.

"There's a general perspective out there that a lot of south eastern Aboriginal culture is lost. I suppose I came into this...thinking this might be some sort of academic or archaeological experience looking up reference books as to try and figure out it might have been done in the past but the reality is the Steaphan's grandfather still has that knowledge and is passing on a living tradition."

The actual skills in removing the bark and constructing the canoe requires knowledge and specific skills.

"It took us a whole weekend to finish it properly. To get the bark off the tree you have to do it at the right time of year and it takes a lot of planning and finding the right tree and the right bark.

At the project's conclusion Steaphan says he found himself with a greater amount of respect for his grandfather and the life he has lead and the skills he possesses.

"You just have more respect for someone who's teaching you this stuff...I was saying that for a lot of the boys, the knowledge that an Elder gives, with that 'hands on' experience of learning, it just sticks with them and it's kind of everlasting."

Speaking the morning after the launch at the Bunjilaka Aboriginal Cultural Centre at the Melbourne Museum, Cam Cope says it was a marvelous event.

"It was a massive night. We had about 270 people RSVP, but I think about 400 turned up. It was a big crowd and there was a lot of positive energy there."

The exhibition features 15 photographs taken by Cam as well as the canoe itself and a short film of the launch of the craft by the Mullett family.

Cam says the final work is always something of a surprise to a photographer, but that he is delighted with the exhibition.

"As a photographer, doing documentary stuff a lot of it is outside of your control."

However having spent time with the Mullett family in East Gippsland and seeing the enormous respect the younger generation have for Uncle Albert and the knowledge that he was passing on, Cam believes that the quality of those relationships is reflected in the final work.

"For them to take time out to come together to do this, to hang on to their knowledge that Uncle Albert has...it was really special to them and it came through in the photography."